Omarosa Could Be Charged With Violating National Security For Situation Room Recording, Top Republican Claims

Omarosa may have been aiming to stir up trouble by releasing a secret recording of White House Chief of Staff John Kelly discussing her departure in the Situation Room, but instead she may have stirred up charges against herself, a top Republican claims.

On Sunday, the former adviser to Donald Trump and villain from his show The Apprentice released audio that had been secretly recorded showing Kelly discussing her leaving the White House. Omarosa Manigault Newman — who is promoting a soon-to-be-released book spilling secrets from her time in the White House — claimed that she had audio of her firing in which it appears Kelly says that leaving quietly and without incident would be best for her reputation going forward, which Omarosa saw as a veiled threat.

“Who in their right mind thinks it’s appropriate to secretly record the White House chief of staff in the Situation Room?” Republican National Committee Chair Ronna Romney McDaniel tweeted. “Secretly recording conversations in the Situation Room isn’t just wildly inappropriate, it’s a threat to our national security. If she broke federal law, she should be prosecuted.”

Other pundits agreed, wondering why Omarosa would shared the audio taken in a room where those with top security clearance discuss matters of national security. Ned Price, a former CIA official who also worked in the Obama administration, said that those who enter the Situation Room are not searched for recording devices because it is a system built on trust.

“Those are supposed to be the finest public servants we have,” Price tweeted. “The WH wasn’t signed for the Omarosas of the world. Sad we now have to accommodate them.”

That also led to some criticism of Donald Trump for even bringing Omarosa on board as a White House adviser when she had no background in policy advising, national security, or even any involvement in politics on any level. She became a Trump favorite as the villain on The Apprentice and made appearances on a number of seasons of the hit reality show.

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Some saw Omarosa’s recording as part of a larger and more worrying trend about the kind of security that is in place in the Trump White House. Conservative commentator Shermichael Singleton openly wondered whether the Russians that Trump invited to the White House could have recorded the conversations just as easily as Omarosa did.